The present invention relates generally to welding guns and, more particularly, to an automatic flow regulator for use in a welding fume gun.
During a welding process, fumes and other particulates are introduced into the work environment that can be undesirable to the workplace environment. For example, in welding processes that utilize shielding gas, it is important that the shielding gas envelopes the weld in order to get a good weld. In order to remove the fumes and particulates that are generated during the welding process, a suction device may be added to the process. Such welding guns are often referred to as fume guns (i.e., welding torches with integrated fume removal features). However, conventional fume guns typically do not offer vacuum flow regulation to enable optimal vacuum flow. Rather, conventional vacuum systems used with fume guns often operate at only one setting (or a limited number of discrete settings).